The Tragic NBA Story Of Darius Miles

Andy Hoops

Darius Miles was a high school basketball legend. His accomplishments at East St. Louis helped him become the #3 pick of the 2000 NBA draft. Unfortunately, his NBA career didn't go as planned...hope you enjoy the video!  I make all kinds of NBA videos which include trivia, analysis, player stories, countdowns, conspiracies, and mysteries. Make sure to leave a like and subscribe if you enjoyed this video!  ► Instagram: @Andy93y ► Twitter: @AndyHoopsYT  ► Music:  On The Cool Side by Kevin MacLeod Eternity by Kevin MacLeod  Available under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license. Find all of his songs and download them for free here: http://incompetech.com  ► Sources:  Player's Tribune article: https://www.theplayerstribune.com/en-us/articles/what-the-hell-happened-to-darius-miles  Other sources: Stats and box-scores from Basketball-Reference.com https://www.riverfronttimes.com/newsblog/2013/03/28/gun-control-dick-durbin-wants-to-lower-east-st-louis-homicide-rate-18-times-us-average http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-bkn-trail-blazers-miles-010909-2009jan09-story.html https://www.bnd.com/news/local/article102254247.html https://www.tmz.com/2017/06/11/darius-miles-auction-lebron-james/

Transcript

00:02What is a bust?

00:05Usually, it's a player who underperforms relative to their draft position.

00:10Over the course of NBA history, there have been a ton of busts, but there are different reasons as to

00:15why they become busts.

00:17Sometimes, they don't have the motivation or drive to get better, other times, maybe they weren't drafted to the right

00:22situation, and must play in an environment that they're not used to.

00:27Maybe they just flat out don't have the talent to succeed in the NBA.

00:30We've seen players dominate college, but their skills don't translate to the pros.

00:34Or maybe they were just drafted too high to begin with.

00:39How's it going, fellas? My name's Andy, and after reading Darius Miles' story on the Players' Tribune, I wanted to

00:45make a video about him myself.

00:47Today, we're gonna take a look at the story of Darius Miles.

00:50Despite having all the talents and all the athleticism in the world, the cards were still stacked against him.

00:59Born in 1981, our story starts off in East St. Louis, Illinois.

01:04At one point, it was one of the biggest cities in the states, but over the last 50-60 years,

01:10the population there has continued to dwindle.

01:12Part of it has to do with the high crime rates.

01:15In a 2013 report, East St. Louis had a homicide rate that's 18 times the average in the United States.

01:23According to Darius Miles from the Players' Tribune, when you pop out of the womb in East St. Louis, it's

01:28guns, drugs, and danger from start to finish.

01:31And I'm not saying that to brag or nothing. It's just what it is. It's the murder capital.

01:36And the thing about it is that it's only 89 blocks.

01:39So, no matter who you are or how much you try to keep your head down, there's nowhere to hide.

01:44You're in it. There's no choice.

01:46It's impossible for anybody to relate to how tough it is to grow up in that neighborhood unless they've actually

01:51been there.

01:52Miles said that he's been shot many times and have seen many of his friends get shot and killed right

01:57in front of his eyes.

01:59Also, according to Miles, there's only been one basketball player who made it out of East St. Louis.

02:05A guy by the name of Lofonzo Ellis, who made it to the NBA and never came back.

02:11It was a city where dreams were never crushed because it was foolish for anybody there to have dreams to

02:16begin with.

02:18Anyway, while the world around Miles was collapsing, he himself continued to focus on what he did best, playing basketball.

02:25In his three years playing basketball in high school, Miles made a name for himself as arguably the greatest high

02:31school player in the country.

02:32At the time, it was between him or Kwame Brown, which, looking back in hindsight, it was kind of funny.

02:38It's quite surprising that neither of them turned out to be good.

02:42However, during the time there, Miles, standing at six foot eight inches tall, averaged 22 points, 13 rebounds, and seven

02:49blocks per game, while basically playing all five positions.

02:53The crowds in their small high school gym were filled to the brink with fans.

02:57Fans who cheered him on, supported him, tried to get his autograph, and also gave him encouragement to declare for

03:02the NBA draft.

03:04And eventually, Miles did choose to forego college and entered directly to the NBA.

03:10Entering the 2000 NBA draft straight out of high school, Darius Miles got selected by the Los Angeles Clippers at

03:16number three.

03:17As a young, 18-year-old moving from East St. Louis to LA, it was a huge culture shock for

03:23him, but at the same time, it was what he wanted.

03:25A breath of fresh air, a change of scenery to move on to the next stage of his life.

03:30His first couple of years in LA did not result in a playoff appearance, but those teams were actually really

03:36fun to watch.

03:37It included Miles, Lamar Odom, Quentin Richardson, Corey Maggetti, Elton Brand.

03:43They were all so young and filled with energy.

03:45Off the court, Miles had his fair share of great stories, including the time where he met Michael Jordan.

03:51Jordan sent Miles and his family free shoes.

03:53And as a young teenager, that excited him a lot.

03:57Another time was when Shaq invited him over to his house and he got to meet a lot of celebrities

04:02there.

04:03Stuff like this was very common in Los Angeles, especially if you were a young, up-and-coming basketball star

04:08like Miles.

04:10Unfortunately, the Clippers gave up on Miles pretty quickly.

04:14While he showed his insane athleticism and could explode to the rim at will, he literally had no jump shot

04:20whatsoever.

04:21It's not like high school where he could just jump over everybody.

04:25In his two years with the Clippers, he averaged about 9 points, 5 or 6 rebounds a game, and made

04:30at least one highlight play every single game.

04:32But he needed to improve in other areas of the game.

04:36However, the Clippers did not want to wait.

04:39At the end of the 2001-2 season, Miles was traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers for Andre Miller.

04:45Cleveland was not any better, they were also rebuilding and felt like Miles had potential to be a major piece

04:51for the team.

04:51But that experiment ended very quickly too.

04:55After just one and a half seasons where Miles did not make any improvements and fell out of the rotation,

05:00the Cavs traded him.

05:02He did have a moment when a reporter asked him about LeBron James and this is what he had to

05:06say.

05:07I don't think you can really just bring a high school player in and really just think your team gonna

05:12really turn around like that.

05:15You know what I'm saying, he can just hop on our bandwagon.

05:19You know, looking back in hindsight, it's pretty funny but at the time, it made sense.

05:24At least the first part did.

05:25We've never seen a player come straight from high school and immediately make an impact on the team.

05:30High school players usually start off slow and need some time to grow.

05:34Well, up until LeBron showed up.

05:36Anyway, by 2004, Miles would get traded to the Portland Trail Blazers, joining the later part of the Jail Blazers

05:43era.

05:44Right when he got there, him and coach Maurice Cheeks did not have a great relationship.

05:49During a film session, Cheeks was criticizing his lackluster defense and Miles responded by cussing him out.

05:56When Cheeks became fed up and started to walk to the GM's office, Miles apparently shouted,

06:01Yeah, that's right, run to your daddy.

06:04This altercation would lead to Miles getting a two-game suspension.

06:08Apparently, the stuff he was saying was so bad that Cheeks even considered quitting.

06:13Despite the rough starts, Miles actually had his best seasons in Portland.

06:17From 2004 to 2006, he was averaging about 13 points a game.

06:22On April 19th, 2005, he even scored a career high 47 points.

06:28Now, at this point of Miles' career, he was 24 years old but this was pretty much the player he's

06:33destined to be.

06:35Occasionally, he would show flashes of brilliance.

06:37But for the most part, he would remain as a hyper-athletic role player and nothing more than that.

06:43In the following season, Miles got off to a hot start but then...

06:49Yeah, yikes.

06:51In April of 2006, he suffered a gruesome knee injury.

06:54An injury that caused him to get microfracture surgery and miss the next two seasons entirely.

07:00This injury also caused some controversy because Miles was still owed 18 million dollars on the remainder of his contract.

07:07But the Blazers said that it was severe enough to be considered as a career-ending injury.

07:11Thus, removing Miles' contract from the salary cap.

07:15However, Miles would actually return to the court in 2009, thus triggering the 18 million salary towards Portland's cap.

07:21But when he came back, he played for the Grizzlies and overall this whole thing was a mess.

07:27Miles did return to the court briefly but that was basically it.

07:31He officially retired after that season and finished his career without a single appearance in the playoffs.

07:37Looking back at the 2000 NBA draft class, it was in my opinion the worst draft class ever and Miles

07:43was one of the biggest busts in history.

07:46However, there was a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes too.

07:50His mother also passed away from cancer which caused him to fall into a deep depression.

07:55For an entire year, he never left his house.

07:58He never responded to any text messages and he was on the verge of giving up.

08:02In 2016, he even filed for bankruptcy as he lost millions of dollars on businesses that were really sketchy.

08:09He was over $200,000 in debt and had to auction off a bunch of his own items to cover

08:15it.

08:16Looking at the list of stuff he sold, most of it was NBA gear, signed by guys like LeBron, Larry

08:22Bird, Dirk, and even his former teammate Lamar Odom.

08:26Additionally, there were some other items like guns and other miscellaneous things.

08:30You know, before that Players Tribune article about Miles came out recently, nobody was really talking about him.

08:37Yeah, he come up in a conversation once in a while, but for the most part, he's been silent for

08:42the last 10 years or so.

08:44Honestly, I thought this article was a great read.

08:47It made me want to look up more stuff about Miles and his NBA career because his story was way

08:52different than the average NBA player today.

08:55Even for the players with a rough upbringing, they pale in comparison to Miles' story.

08:59I took some quotes from the Players Tribune article earlier, but there's a lot of good stuff there.

09:04Even if you have no idea who Darius Miles is, you could still read it.

09:08It shows a different perspective.

09:10It describes the journey of an NBA player through hardships and misfortune.

09:14I definitely recommend it and I'll put a link in the description below.

09:18Anyway, nowadays he seems to be doing pretty well.

09:21He moved to Florida and lives close to his friend Quentin Richardson.

09:25He's been slowly trying to get his life back on track, but it's getting better.

09:29And that sums up the story of Darius Miles.

09:32He used to be one of the most hyped up high school players in the country and he had all

09:36the physical tools to succeed in the NBA.

09:39However, a myriad of different problems caused his downfall.

09:43While his legacy was a bust who never lived up to his potential, there was so much more to his

09:48story than what people realized.

09:50Anyway, thank you everyone so much for watching.

09:52I hope you enjoyed the video and as always, I'll see you next time.

09:55Peace.

10:01Peace.

10:03Peace.

10:05Peace.

10:06Peace.

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